a/n: Kicking off 2019 with another Yume Nikki piece! Much like Façade, this had been sitting dormant for a couple years before I decided to explore the concept further. I'm gonna make an effort to finish as many fics as I can this year, regardless of fandom.
Another morning bleeding into the next, and the same sense of stagnation, staring at the outline of the window turned horizontal on her side and the empty gray sky visible between ratty curtains that can't hope to block out the sun. The unsteady pattering beat against the windowpane signifies a change in temperature. Traffic outside is sparse and only makes her aware of how utterly alone she is. Nobody has come knocking since her last argument with the neighbor through the closed door that she remember in pieces and incites the same constriction in her chest.
Thinking also invites a headache, but she can't help herself.
Teaching herself to live without the discordant hum of the heater, piling on clothes in layers like a homeless bum, and she knows it's only going to be a pain to get undressed again. Shut all the windows, check the door every half-hour, then every hour, then whenever she happens to recall the need through the fog of oversleep and lackluster nutrition — even though she knows it's locked, and it isn't going to magically unlock itself.
A sense of familiarity taken for granted — the curtains were red, or were they really orchid or maroon, and would she be able to tell the difference or is it just a means of identifying her dreams from reality? — it's the kind of tendency that leads to paranoia.
Maybe she just needs something to do.
Eyelids feel heavy. Blinking gums up her eyes and she rubs them without enthusiasm. Too hot to fall back into unconsciousness in her nest of sheets and excess clothing and her sweat-sticky skin. These layers alone should smother her into feverishness, but there's no weight to her self-made prison; head's heavy, lolling on the bed.
Turning aside, the window is no longer spattered with rain, sky obscured by a thick fog. The TV plays a static image, warping over itself, never the same pattern twice. She must've dozed off without realizing it.
She doesn't really want to move, even in a dream. In the real world she has to get up to pee, or feed herself, or consume orange juice and/or sleeping pills. But the scene refuses to change the longer she lies still, so she rolls out of bed and the sheets do not imprison her but peel away, leaving her with the clothes she rested in and nothing more.
Stumbing to the door, she finds another staircase. It's dark and unfamiliar, nothing like the nexus. What's the worst that can happen in a dream? Dreams can be about whatever you want.
She descends the steps without a banister. Dozens of hands splayed like trees hanging limply vertical. Nothing can touch her as she travels deeper in. There's a pattering in her head, echoing through the void like an auditorium but the hands have nothing to drum upon and she can't make sense of it.
Eventually the stairs diverge into solid ground, another doorway forming out of nothing. The pattering is drowned out by a low, mechanical droning that she can feel in her bones.
A strong urge to wake up is superseded by the disappointment she knows it will bring. Her footsteps echo dully off the walls and a chill grips her. Dank moisture fills her nostrils. She keeps on walking.
The hallway ends because she wills it; in flames. Unsure what this means but not willing to dwell further on her own fickle perceptions of this dream-reality, she equips the Umbrella effect and watches the fire's death without external emotion. The stale air turns steamy and fills her lungs to capacity. She doesn't choke, breathing normally, and proceeds through the empty doorframe.
The colors melt away into white and the smell of the underground evaporates into nothing; as quickly as it had vanished, the world forms again into a dome, like a fishbowl, more pearlescent than translucent.
It's like a spaceship. The area is devoid of much furniture, but there is a console with dozens of buttons and screens behind the white grand piano. The windows are purely aesthetic and offer no view outside. It's quiet, save for her breathing, though she does not feel at peace.
An alien man stands between her and the piano; he's a tall, gangly thing with pallid skin, dressed in a smart looking tuxedo, dress pants and gloves to match his lank black hair. He chirps timorously at her intrusion. She walks up to him curiously, circling like a vulture. He doesn't seem to mind, or care, or understand anything at all, really. He just keeps gibbering at her like a broken toy before eventually losing interest and eyeing the piano as though in contemplation.
She wonders how long he's been here, if he's just a person in another bed, in another room. Can lucid dreams be shared? She doesn't know, and the thought disturbs her.
She walks past him and finds a smaller bedroom.
In her mind she works over her situation. He's helpless. Alone, and unsuspecting. Just like her.
A memory of a girl and her shadow creeps into her head. She feels uneasy, suddenly. Once more trapped in a room within her head, she sits on the clean white bed that is not hers and tries to compose herself. There can be no more mistakes. And this time won't be like the others.
Fingering the hilt of the knife, she hadn't remembered drawing it out. He'd choke on his own blood before he could scream.
The thought is sickening but she can't stop dwelling on it. The blood on her hands. The safety of solitude.
He hasn't raised a hand against her. He plays piano and warbles to himself. And yet she would feel so much safer if he wasn't breathing. She doesn't even know the alien's name, or when they'll land, or how long she's been asleep in her head.
Dissuading the thought. She can hear a tinkling melody. The piano is electric.
She knows what she has to do.
Shuffling out into the main room again, he is indeed seated at the piano. He's playing a familiar song, but she can't put a name to it without lyrics.
Her chest constricts as she approaches. This is her dream.
Her hands are slippery with sweat but she grips the knife fiercely. She has one chance at this, staring fixedly at the tips of his hair coming down to his left shoulder. She's unsure now if he is really wearing a suit; this strengthens her resolve.
The blade sinks into his shoulder and he shrieks like a synthesizer. Alarmed, she pulls the weapon free and plunges it a second time, driving him face-first into the keyboard. His cry of pain is matched by the discordant blaring of the instrument as she grabs him by the hair and stabs him in the throat when he tries to turn on her, holding the hilt to his windpipe.
His blood is thick, black like ink, like gasoline or tar, and it is a gift that keeps giving.
She watches while he chokes on it and feels nothing but adrenaline coursing through her body. He gurgles and quivers and twitches spasmodically, like a broken toy. He tries to wail but can't, and his mouth is sticky with blood, smeared over his pallid face. His arms outstretch as if to capture her or plea for help.
She shoves him away, finally allowing herself some measure of disgust. By then he's already dying. She stares at him longer than is necessary but cannot reason why.
Eventually the sight becomes too sickening and she stumbles back into the bed and curls up in the sheets, staining them black, too empty to cry.